SOTF Champions
SOTF Champions is a highly popular video game in the world of SOTF-TV, originally released in January 2012, shortly before the debut of Season 21. It is an online game in the MOBA—Multiplayer Online Battle Arena—genre, and generally features two teams of five players battling it out across matches lasting between 20-40 minutes on average. The game is played in realtime, with each player taking control of a single character—or Champion—for the duration of a match, making use of their set of unique innate abilities and steadily augmenting their power by purchasing equipment and items. The standard game type sees the two teams facing opposite one another, each of them with their own territory and base protected by a series of towers. 'Minions', weak allied units, spawn periodically in waves, charging at the other side's towers. In a given match, each side will aim to destroy the other team's towers whilst protecting their own until they are able to reach the enemy base and win the game by destroying that. There is a vibrant professional esports scene surrounding Champions. It reached semi-professional status between 2014 and 2015 and then developed into a full fledged regulated and broadcast league in November 2015. The first world championships for the game were hosted in Las Vegas, Nevada in September of 2016, and have been held in the fall of every year since then. Most of the professional Champions leagues attempt to run a schedule opposite SOTF-TV itself, although there is inevitably some overlap, which almost invariably results in viewing figures tanking horribly. Naturally, Champions draws heavily off real-life TV seasons for its content. Characters are drawn from participants in TV, maps feature popular arenas used for the game, and items are often based off of iconic weapon draws from TV. New characters are released regularly, and the team will often have the hottest contestant from the latest season ready to go within a week of the TV conclusion. The pool isn't solely winners; going for a mixture of fan favourites, dark horses and big personalities (with a sprinkling of themes which make for a larger-than-life Champion), as well as a handful of original characters unique to the roster. The frantic release schedule and limited testing period sees the developers working around the clock for balances and tweaks, and the professional game generally lags several patches behind the live version just to ensure that pro-play isn't too wildly contingent on whichever new champ has shipped completely overpowered. Although this does see some criticism of the professional scene not being able to show off new characters, the critical acclaim given to the balance team for their work on SOTF Champions suggests that they have taken the correct approach. Roster Top Laners Sometimes jokingly referred to as 'Top Lane Island', Top Lane is generally the most isolated part of the map from the rest of the game, and hence characters who are played here are generally self sufficient and able to handle laning by themselves. In a team, they generally take up the role of tank and bruiser, dishing out solid amounts of damage whilst soaking up that of the opposing team. * Kenshin 'Kenny' Yamana (Season Three) - Something of a mold breaker, Kenny lacks inherent durability but deals a lot of damage. He is at his best in short skirmishes when he can get in, land some heavy hits, and then back out before the enemy has a chance to retaliate. Kenny is seen as a mid-high risk, mid-high reward character, as he can build tanky items to increase his staying power, but sacrifices his ability to duel. In the right hands, he is very snowbally, and is the bane of low-tier games. ** Abilities *** Ultimate ® Home Run! - After a brief wind up, Kenny strikes the targeted enemy with his bat, knocking them back. If the victim hits a wall or teammate, they stop, suffering heavy damage and are stunned. If colliding with an ally, that ally suffers the same amount of damage. ** Skins *** Baseball Kenny - Kenny in a TV-themed baseball outfit. It is noted for the excellent dynamic splash art (featuring a signature Kenny grin as he smashes a grenade flying with his bat) and various funny SFX as he wields his bat in game. *** Megalomaniac Kenny - Released in conjunction with James Bond, Survival Without Borders, this well-polished skin is a direct portrayal of Kenny's character in the film, Jin Takahashi, and was sponsored to co-promote film and game. Suave, white-suited, and with plenty of lines either referencing or quoting the film, it is the skin of choice for the cross-media fanbase. * Samara Bain (Season Four) - A versatile and effective all-rounder, Samara has damage, tankiness and crowd control all in one package. She is occasionally also played as a support and a jungler, although her lack of area of effect means she struggles to clear (and by extension, push waves). She is almost never out of the meta, and is one of the most consistently picked characters in professional play. Primarily wields a roundshield, but also equipped with brass knuckles. ** Abilities *** (Q) Flurry - Samara strikes the targeted enemy with her brass knuckles, dealing bonus damage and acting as an auto attack reset. Samara gains 'charges' of this ability over time, the duration shortening with level, up to a maximum of three. Expending all three charges in quick succession on a single target grants Samara a burst of speed. *** (W) Dauntless Advance - Samara dashes a short distance, extending her shield out in front of her. Incoming damage from the front is greatly mitigated for a short duration, and projectiles are intercepted. *** (E) Shield Smash - Samara launches a spinning backhanded blow with her shield. Foes struck by this attack are knocked back and stunned. *** Ultimate ® Crushing Impact - Samara leaps high into the air and then crashes to the ground. Enemies in the impact zone are damaged and either slowed or stunned, depending on their proximity to the landing point. The brief channel time and on-ground indicator gives opponents a short window to react. ** Skins *** Roller Derby Samara - A fairly simple skin where Samara is wearing colourful rollerblading gear in place of her usual equipment. A recent update to the skin replaced her 'fast run' animation with a rollerblading one. *** Hoplite Samara - A skin themed around Ancient Greece, Samara's shield is replaced by a more elaborate and larger model painted with a bear, she is wearing golden armour with a plumed helm, and her knuckles are replaced by a caestus. * Ashley Mei (Season Fourteen) - A traditional tank, Ashley is a frontline beast who makes an impact by being impossible to ignore. She has great ability to disrupt and lock down priority targets, but lacks follow up damage outside of teamfighting, so if she fails to immediately take someone out, she is usually unable to finish them off alone. ** Abilities *** Ultimate ® Ferocious Charge - Ashley runs forward, gradually gaining speed as she moves. The first enemy she collides with is carried along with her and suppressed. At the conclusion of her charge, Ashley slams her spear into the ground, knocking back nearby enemies and heavily damaging the primary target. The further she has traveled before the collision, the further the enemy is carried, and the more damage is dealt--should she hit a wall, the first target is stunned. ** Skins *** Olympic Ashley - Olympics/Javelin themed skin where Ashley is wearing an athletics outfit and wielding a javelin rather than her spear. *** Medieval Ashley - A knight themed skin, featuring Ashley wearing an elaborate suit of armour. Although her ultimate always has an audio cue, it is in this skin replaced with a bugle theme. *** Meime - An extremely tongue-in-cheek skin, replete with internet and pop culture references, especially those relating to 'Hatchet Girl' the film. For unknown reasons, she wears a unicorn onesie. Mid Laners Mid lane is a complex position characterised by its population of mages and assassins. One of a team's main damage dealing threats will almost always be the mid laner, and the mid also has a much greater ability to influence the rest of the game by roaming into other lanes or drawing pressure. Mid is also the shortest lane, making it frequently quite mechanically intensive and needing a lot of focus on management of waves of minions. * Allison 'A.C. Bones' Christopher (Season One) - Widely played midlaner and sometimes taken into bot lane as an ADC, Bones is a mechanically intensive character destructive in the right hands but completely useless in the wrong ones. This does not prevent her being picked constantly by people who have no idea what they're doing. She has massive damage potential and good mobility but zero defences and can easily launch herself straight to her death. Wields a bow. ** Abilities *** Passive - Hunter's Snare - A.C's basic attacks and regular abilities apply a stack of 'Pinning Arrows'. At four stacks, the target is rooted and suffers bonus damage. *** (Q) Full Draw - A.C nocks an arrow and holds it, steadily increasing range and damage. At maximum draw, the arrow doubles, each projectile firing in an arc which converges on the point A.C aimed at. If both projectiles hit the same target, two stacks of her passive are applied. The doubled arrows each deal 75% damage. *** (W) Acro-Archery - A.C flips to the side, rotating a set distance around the targeted point and firing an arrow. Although this does represent a small amount of forward motion, it is very awkward to use as a gapcloser or escape due to most of the movement being sideways. *** (E) Rolling Bones - A.C dives into a combat roll, which can be used to traverse small areas of terrain. If the roll ends within a short distance to an enemy, Bones strikes them with a shiv, which deals increased damage the lower the health of the target. *** Ultimate ® Arrowstream - A.C. begins to fire a stream of arrows in a thin line in front of her. Enemies struck by these arrows are greatly slowed and gradually pushed backward. A.C. can move and use her W and E whilst the stream persists, allowing her to reorient herself and her aim. ** Skins *** Ranger A.C - Part of a fantasy set of skins which are loosely themed around dungeons and dragons and more recent SOTF-TV spinoffs. A.C is dressed in typical fantasy fashion, including leather armour and a green cloak. Although a relatively basic and cheaply priced skin, Ranger has received a lot of praise for the massive amount of detail put into the model and the gorgeous splash art. *** Underworld A.C - A tie-in skin to the popular iRoad of Bones/i action-adventure game, featuring her iconic outfit and gear from that title. The outfit has one bare shoulder, one shoulder pad in a dark 'shadowed' ensemble. Also included is A.C's signature Bone bow, alongside several of the sound effects represented in the game. A number of voice lines are also directly taken or adapted. An announcer pack styled after iRoad of Bones/i's narrator The Gravekeeper was released in conjunction with the skin. * The Collar (Champions original) - A bizarre mascot character who absolutely never shuts up, The Collar is a very strange combination of anthropomorphic collar and some kind of weird schoolgirl. Her skin has a metallic sheen in most of her skins, and tends to have clothing/pattern updates based around changes to the main collar design (invariably splitting her playerbase between those who like the change and those who hate it). Originally designed as a support, Collar has become primarily played in mid lane because her ability ratios are very strong and she has strong 1v1 kill potential. She is widely known as 'Collar-chan', although it is unclear where this nickname originated from. Collar players have a reputation of being creepy, perverted, or secret Champions gods. Wields a pair of collars. ** Abilities *** Passive - Collars Akimbo - Collar's auto-attacks take on different characteristics depending on whether she is currently holding both, one, or neither of her collars. With both collars, she attacks twice simultaneously at 90% and 30% damage. With one collar, she gains attack speed. With neither, she deals only 50% damage, but applies a small stun on hit, though this cannot affect the same target more than once every few seconds. If holding no collars, Collar is locked out of casting abilities (except Q and E with W) until one returns to her. *** (Q) Heads Up! - Collar pirouettes and then throws a collar out in an arc. The first enemy hit suffers damage and a slow, and the collar rebounds and returns to her. If Collar catches it, part of the cooldown is refunded. *** (W) Hula-Hoop! - After a brief wind-up, Collar throws a collar out in a line. If it connects with an enemy or ally, the collar expands in a 'hoop' effect and then 'grabs' them, rooting them very briefly, and then pulling to her. Hula-Hoop! can be cast in conjunction with both Heads Up! and Circle Guard, which results in the 'hoop' effect at the targeted point. *** (E) Circle Guard - Collar throws a collar to the targeted ally, granting them a shield and applying bonus armour and magic resist for as long as it remains with them. If she recasts the spell, the collar returns to her. *** Ultimate ® Mega Lasso - Collar spins one of her collars overhead and then launches it forward, expanding it into a huge zone. Any enemies caught in the zone when it lands suffer damage and are pulled inward when the lasso is tightened. The closer to the centre of the zone, the greater the damage, the closer to the edge, the greater the displacement. ** Skins *** Super Dancer Collar - In this skin, Collar's collars are replaced by tambourines and her usual schoolgirl outfit with brightly coloured dancing garb. She has extra lines, most of which are absolutely painful puns about various dances. *** Ultimate Spirit Collar - A pricey skin, US Collar has a plethora of effects on her abilities, including fireworks, sound effects, and a snippet of song which she recites when casting Mega Lasso (in place of the usual audio cue). Her 'dance' emote also features a lengthy song/performance praising SOTF.